There’s a highway they want to build from Damansara to Puchong–called Kidex, and just like any other highway before, people are understandably worried about the construction. This excerpt from the KL-Chronicle details the causes of anxiety:
[box icon=“chat”]Kidex will be constructed over heavily built-up residential areas in Petaling Jaya and will pass very close to schools, houses and places of worship. It will pass just 5m away from two schools – Bukit Bintang Boys Secondary School and Sri Petaling Primary School. Its distance from the Tun Abdul Aziz Mosque in Section 14 is listed as 7m and from St Paul’s Church as 18m. Houses in parts of Sections 2, 4, 7 and 8 will be just 10m from the highway
And so, when Kidex had their townhall last week, a group of protesters showed up to voice their displeasure–as should be allowed in a democratic society. Kidex claimed they had conducted a survey that proved that the majority of the people wanted the highway, this was hotly contested by the Say No to Kidex committee, who contended that the survey wasn’t ‘authentic’.
The video below (from Malaysiakini) has a great interview with the secretary of the Say No to Kidex committee outlining their points of contention on the survey by Kidex. (starts at 1:10)
1. The initial Kidex survey of 300 respondents--of which 73.4% were agreeable to the building of the highway. 2. The Say No to Kidex committee did their own survey on 20 different locations, including the Mosque, Schools, and the resident associations of the areas affected by the highway. 3. Say No to Kidex can't comment on how many people they've engaged but can confirm it was more than 300. 4.Hence the public perception of the initial Kidex survey is negative. 5.The list of the initial 300 respondents has not been shared--as it was confidential. 6.The survey was conducted by a Ph.D in statistics, but this survey itself was funded by Kidex. 7.The next survey as planned by Kidex would have 2000 respondents.Now let's take this apart one by one, because there is some maths here is quite foreign to most--this is the world of probability and statistics.